Kansas more than 'Dust in the Wind'

Topeka band's 40-year longevity put state on rock music map

Kansas drummer Phil Ehart plays at a Feb. 9, 2009, dress rehearsal of the band's "There's Know Place Like Home" CD/DVD package recorded live that night with the Washburn University Symphony Orchestra in White Concert Hall.

Kansas co-founder and its principal songwriter Kerry Livgren, along with the other members of the rock band, will be inducted into the Kansas Hall of Fame on Friday at Washburn University. Other inductees of the 2013 class include the Menninger family and James Naismith.

Guitarist Rich Williams, left, and keyboardist and vocalist Steve Walsh, perform with their band Kansas at a Feb. 9, 2009, dress rehearsal of their "There's Know Place Like Home" CD/DVD package recorded live that night with the Washburn University Symphony Orchestra in White Concert Hall.

Kansas keyboardist and vocalist Steve Walsh performs with the band at a Feb. 9, 2009, dress rehearsal of their "There's Know Place Like Home" CD/DVD package recorded live that night with the Washburn University Symphony Orchestra in White Concert Hall.

Kansas co-founder and its principal songwriter Kerry Livgren, left, makes a guest appearance with the current lineup of the band, including drummer Phil Ehart, at a Feb. 9, 2009, dress rehearsal of their "There's Know Place Like Home" CD/DVD package recorded live that night with the Washburn University Symphony Orchestra in White Concert Hall.

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The idea of being inducted into a Hall of Fame never occurred to the aspiring young rockers as they first rehearsed in an empty Topeka dance studio.

In the years before the release of the first of their top 20 singles and multiplatinum albums in the mid-1970s, the founding members of the rock band Kansas dreamed only of playing somewhere other than Midwest dance hall/biker bars — places where chicken-wire fencing was sometimes necessary to separate bands from the debris occasionally hurled by overserved customers.

"Our expectations were always local,” said Phil Ehart, whose tenure as a rock musician began with Knollwood-neighborhood rehearsals with a basement band of Topeka West High School buddies before evolving into a 40-year career as the only drummer Kansas would ever know.

"We started out just hoping to play a high school prom, maybe a frat party if we got good enough,” Ehart added. “When we accomplished those goals it became, ‘Wouldn't it be cool to play Kansas City, or KU or K-State.’ Then we're playing Hays and Wichita, driving up and down I-70 in an old school bus. That's when you start dreaming about going all the way down I-70 to Denver.”

Kerry Livgren's dream was even more simple.

"Back then all I ever wanted to do was see the inside of a real recording studio before I died,” said Livgren, a Topeka West guy who wrote most of Kansas' best-known songs.

Flash ahead to today, 40-plus years later, to June 21 at Washburn University's White Concert Hall. Nine now-senior men who put Kansas — the band and the state — on the international rock music map will take their rightful place in the Kansas Hall of Fame alongside a president, several U.S. senators, the world's most famous aviatrix, the inventor of college basketball and the brothers who advanced the field of psychiatric medicine.

"That's pretty elite company,” said an appreciative Livgren, a resident of Berryton. “For any Kansan to be inducted in a Hall of Fame with Dwight Eisenhower and that group is pretty special.

"But, I'd like to think we also contributed something to the state in taking its name. At first we wondered if we could do it. Would we be sued?”

The history

Hardly. For in combining traditional rock rhythms with a symphonic, almost orchestral background of violins and keyboards, Kansas amassed a body of work that includes 23 albums and two Top 20 singles, eight gold-record albums and three multiplatinum albums.

Their most famous singles, “Carry On Wayward Son” and “Dust in the Wind,” still rank among the top records played on classic rock radio stations.

"They introduced Kansas to much of the country,” said Alan Blasco, a board member of the Kansas Music Hall of Fame and a rock contemporary of Kansas in the 1960s and '70s.

"They had a unique sound that brought progressive rock to a new generation, and it came from a Midwest perspective. 'Dust in the Wind' is an epic song that resonates from the Heartland much the same way Bob Seger's music represented Michigan and Bruce Springsteen's did New Jersey.”

But Kansas was always more than a name to the band. Its background is steeped in state locations, from its early gigs at tough joints like Topeka's Touch of Gold (S.W. 10th and Auburn), to the demo tape recorded in Liberal — “Internationally known for its recording studios,” Ehart joked — to the 1973 central Kansas concert at the tiny Ellinwood Opera House, where the band arranged a tryout show for a New York record executive, using the promise of free beer as a marketing tool.

A lot of road passed under the band's wheels between Topeka, Ellinwood and “the rest is history” part of the story.

It was sometime around 1970 when high school bandmates Ehart and Dave Hope — sons of an Air Force colonel and a magistrate judge, respectively — first got together with Livgren, who brought a love of classical music to his rock efforts with another band. Commonly known today as Kansas I, the group first rehearsed, Livgren remembered, at the Domme Dance Studio on S.W. 6th. The group later established a “band house” nearby at 431 S.W. Roosevelt, where band members, crew and a few girlfriends lived and developed their music.

Kansas I — bass player Hope, Ehart, Livgren, vocalist Lynn Meredith, keyboardists Don Montre and Dan Wright with Larry Baker on sax — lasted about one year but had some moments in the sun in opening for The Doors in New Orleans. Livgren, Meredith, Montre and Wright broke off to form what Wheatheads called Kansas II. Ehart and Hope reformed White Clover, a more classic rock group with Topeka West buddy Rich Williams on guitar, Missouri native Steve Walsh on keyboards and vocals with classically trained Lawrence violinist Robby Steinhardt also doing vocals.

From their band house at 1312 S.W. 17th, they wrote “Can I Tell You” and four other songs for the Liberal recording session that landed a demo on the desk of Hall of Fame recording executive Don Kirshner, one of the biggest names in pop music.

But Kirshner wanted to hear the band live before signing it. Believing the group was on the edge of a break, Ehart talked Livgren into returning, and in 1973 “Kansas III” — Ehart, Livgren, Hope, Williams, Walsh and Steinhardt — began planning the concert in tiny Ellinwood that sealed their run into history.

"The six of us knew this would probably be our only shot,” Ehart recalled. “There wouldn't be many record companies coming to Kansas to hear us. How could we put a large group of people in one place where we could look good?

"So, we gave away free beer.”

The charts

The concert, and perhaps the beer, made an impression on Wally Gold, a Kirshner exec who had flown into nearby Great Bend. Kansas got its first recording contract, and in 1974 released its first self-titled album.

"Kansas” wasn't a big commercial hit, but “Can I Tell You” got enough air play that Kirshner put the band on the road, opening for such mega stars as The Kinks, and gave them two more albums. Neither “Songs for America” nor “Masque” did what Kirshner envisioned, and the band eventually took his strong suggestion to record something shorter and more commercial.

Thus came 1976's “Leftoverture” album with “Carry On,” a classic rocker that topped out at No. 11 on the Billboard chart. A year later came “Point of Know Return” with the rocking title cut and the mega-hit “Dust.” Featuring the memorable acoustic guitars of Livgren and Williams with Steinhardt's haunting violin solo, “Dust” reached No. 6 on the Billboard singles chart.

"I'm still stunned at the popularity of that song, which began as a finger-picking exercise in learning to play acoustic guitar,” said Livgren.

"I'd grown up hearing stories about how my grandfather had this big tract of land near Sharon Springs wiped out by the Dust Bowl,” he explained. “He would have been a rich man had he been able to keep all that land.”

Now the group became a touring act, playing Madison Square Garden and other big-arena shows. And like so many bands, there was the eventual falling out — Livgren leaving in 1983 to musically explore his Christianity. Kansas continued to record under changing memberships but never hit to the extent of “Carry On” and “Dust.” It had lesser hits with 1979's “People of the South Wind,” a tribute to native Americans of Kansas, and “Hold On” in 1980.

The founding members have split and regrouped over the years, most notably for the 2000 album “Somewhere to Elsewhere” recorded at Livgren's Berryton studio built in a barn on his farm.

The band today

Today, Kansas is a still-touring Atlanta-based band featuring Ehart and Williams — the only two members to go the distance — and Walsh playing with David Ragsdale (violin) and Billy Greer (bass and vocals).

All five plan to be in Topeka for the induction ceremony, along with Livgren, Hope (now a Florida minister), Steinhardt and Jeff Glixman, an early vocalist/keyboards player from Topeka High who has been the group's producer for many years.

"The binding force is still the music, the journey,” Ehart said of the 40-year longevity. "Those are pretty long odds that six guys out of Topeka wearing overalls and cowboy boots and playing very odd-time signature music would end up selling 30 million records and celebrating a 40-year anniversary.

“But we still love what we do, and we never take anything for granted. Every night we walk on the stage, we know we have to deliver the goods. You see those faces in the crowd, and you play ‘Carry On’ and ‘Dust’ and ‘Point of Know Return’ and ‘Hold On’ and ‘The Wall,’ and the crowd response is huge. That's when you know you're doing something not many people get to do, and you remember how fortunate you are.”

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At an early age I was into a different style of music, but with age comes wisdom. " Dust " and
"Son" should never be forgotten. Watched them play on the stage at THS in '69 or '70 as a sophmore- pretty cool.

Dr Naismith? He was a CANADIAN. And really had developed a version of the game elsewhere, but then brought it out of his bag at KU as an exercise routine.

Eisenhower was from Texas before ending up in Kansas.

Arlen Specter and Bob Dole? Do we REALLY want to claim them?
(Specter is the one who "invented" one of the most ridiculous, but yet still believed, whacko conspiracy theories the world has ever known: The "Magic Bullet Theory" that Oswald supposedly shot that hit Kennedy and tex Gov Connolly 7 times....and fell out practically un-damaged.)
(Bob Dole is remembered by "friends" of his from far back in his Highschool days and into his political career as being very dishonest, and having no regard for the truth. And would stoop to any lie and cheat just to win any "debate" or convince someone to sign off on something. A master con artist.)

Certainly Kansas is a noteworthy band. They had some good songs and some great musicians and creative forces.
But I'm not sure that *I* would want to be "honored" by being included in THAT "Hall Of Fame".

And I have worked very hard my entire life to make sure that never happens to me.

were chosen. when I lived out-of-state, that dust song always reminded me of home whenever I heard it and it has long been a favorite. somebody told me years ago that Kansans seemed to be pretty laid-back unless confronted with nonsense; we do not suffer fools well. did not really notice that too much until I moved back here but I believe it's true, especially in the smaller, more rural towns. scratching out a living during a dust bowl back then, yup, it would either make you or break you... they definitely deserve the honor.

American Heritage Dictionary definition of fascism: "...a system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with belligerent nationalism."

I reflect on what an amazing chemistry and style they have. One of a kind. A truly great band in any era.

"Point Of Know Return" -- the album -- is an amazing composition throughout, and seems like a concept album. I imagine the band was one of the earliest fusions of rock and classical.

They opened for the Kinks back then? I absolutely always loved the Kinks who pushed rhythm and blues to a new space, though that was not really what Ray Davies was. He admitted recently that he never learned to play and sing "You Really Got Me" at the same time (kinda tricky). But I would bet the Kinks were intimidated by Kansas's chops.

For anyone who appreciates excellence. Kansas, Masque and Song For America are my personal favorites. Kansas was one of the few bands who sounded just as good, if not better, in person. Topeka in particular, and the state of Kansas in general, should be grateful this band had its beginnings here. I know I am!

...when I lived at 33rd & Arnold Ave., I could hear Kansas practicing over on Oakley. The neighbors were upset about "having a rock band in the neighborhood"! My dad would say, "... at least they are not breaking into cars, getting your daughters pregnant or stealing anything. What's wrong with a little noise?" Finally his point became clear. It did sound like wailing guitars and trash can lids at first but that little noise became an awesome noise! So proud of the band!

Better do your homework from now on. You state that Eisenhower was from Texas before "ending up in Kansas." True, Ike was born in the Lone Star state. But he was an infant when his family headed north to Kansas. That's how he "ended up " in Kansas.

The majesty of the song "Song For America", power of "Icarus (Borne On Wings Of Steel)" and the epic nature of the entire "side 2" of the first album are my favorites. I LIKED the longer stuff, and though I still liked a lot of what they did later, I don't think they topped those first three.

For those of you who started at Leftoverture and have heard little of their first three releases...there is some excellent stuff on them.

To play the intricate stuff that they play...and play it even CLOSE live...takes skill and dedication. These are not your average "3-chord garage-band" songs. I always put Ehart in the top 10 drummers in rock...and that's alongside all the others in no particular ranking within them.

Also, a lot of their lyrics may seem a bit "prog-rock pompous" and inaccessible to some, but I always welcomed something that wasn't "cliched to death" at that time.